New Reports - Accounts and Users Users can get a listing of the users assigned to accounts within the account hierarchy. The columns that are returned can be selected by the user to make the report the most valuable. As with all reports, the user can specify the depth of the account hierarchy (starting with the current account) that will be reported on. Report can also be exported to a Comma Separated Values report which can be viewed using spreadsheet style tools.
New Reports - New Output Type for Comprehensive Reports When running comprehensive reports, the user can select the report output type from three options, which include: HTML (on screen), PDF (Adobe Portable Document Format) or CSV (Comma Separated Values, suitable for spreadsheet applications).
New Reports - NIMS Compliance Objective Progress Report A new report is available that tracks each accounts reported compliance with the NIMS Compliance Objectives and shows implementation progress from previous years.
New Permission Type - "Standard with Rollup" A new permission type similar to the "Standard" permission type has been created to allow standard users to submit their account's assessment for rollup. Users of this account will be able to edit the assessment and perform a rollup, but will not be able to manage user permissions on the account or create sub-accounts.
Read-Only Users can view Metric Assessment Forms Users with "Read-only" or "Read-only with Inheritance" permission can view the assessment responses of accounts using the assessment response forms (they used to only be able to view reports). They will not be able to save any changes made to the assessment.
Disabling of FY2007 Metrics Collection With the release of the FY2008 Metrics, the FY2007 Metrics have been disabled for input. Data entered into the FY2007 NIMSCAST is preserved and available for viewing and reporting. States have the option to extend the period that FY2007 metrics can be collected if desired. Details on how to re-open the FY2007 collection follow.
Control Collections by Fiscal Year State administrators have the ability to control what year collections are open for their constituents to fill in. This can be useful to limit the number of collections that are available to users to only those required, while allowing for the extension of collection periods to meet State needs.
Ability to Add Custom Guidance to State and Local Metrics Administrators of State accounts can provide additional guidance to their constituents. This guidance is provided on a per Compliance Objective (2008) and per account type basis. Guidance will be viewable to all applicable accounts and will be visible under the IMSID Compliance Objectives. The text will be pre-pended with "State Guidance:"
Assist Sub-Account Users with Email Address and Passwords Administrators can assist users with tasks such as changing their email address or resetting their passwords if the user's (to be updated) NIMSCAST permissions are fully within the scope of the administrator attempting to assist. In other words, if a user who has permission on a single county account in the state of Oregon, the administrator of the Oregon account will be able to assist the user with updating their User Profile information, including their password.
Management of Public Registration Process Administrators of state accounts can use the system tools to help them manage new public registration requests. Using this function, registrations will be pending until acted on by an authorized state administrator. The state administrator can decide if the proposed user registration should be included in their existing account hierarchy, belong outside the official account structure, or do not warrant access to NIMSCAST.
When a NIMSCAST user submits one or more Corrective Action Plans (CAPs), they are made available to the parent account for review. When the parent account user clicks on Review Rollup CAPs, they are provided the opportunity to review individual account CAPS, and furthermore approve or disapprove CAPs.
A filter had been provided that will allow the parent account to:
Select the entire assessment or one section;
Show CAPs that are In Progress or Overdue;
Choose the Sub-account level;
Choose the Review status – Incomplete, Approved, Disapproved; and
Apply date parameters.
Once the filter options are selected, the parent account user is taken to the CAP, where they approve or disapprove and can provide comments regarding the CAP. Once the parent account user approves or disapproves a CAP, the sub-account user is notified via email of the outcome and any comments regarding the CAP. This new feature also provides a listing of all the subaccounts with CAPs submitted with their rollup.
When a NIMSCAST user completes their assessment and/or Corrective Action Plan (CAP), they will receive a notification that they need to click Submit for Rollup. If a user has already submitted their assessment for rollup, but has made further changes to their assessment or CAP they will receive the notification. By clicking on Submit for Rollup when information has been updated the parent account rollup report will be updated with the new information.
The NIMS Compliance Assistance Support Tool (NIMSCAST), originally released on April 9, 2007 and since updated on July 19. The following features have recently been integrated into the NIMSCAST:
Corrective Action Plans (CAPs) Updates
Capability to view the CAPs form while answering metric questions in a non-affirmative manner,
Capability to collect CAPS for Tier 2 metrics (the CAP is still not required to complete an assessment, however)
Enhanced E-mail Capabilities
Ability to attach documents to intra-NIMSCAST e-mails;
Ability to target e-mails to subsets of the user hierarchy based on accounts that have not rolled up and/or have CAPs; and
NIMSCAST will generate a reminder e-mail signifying that a CAP’s compliance date has passed. The e-mail will contain the CAP as well as the necessary instructions on how to update it.
Reporting Enhancements
Summary Assessment Report summarizes an account’s compliance metrics assessment; this report can be used as a State or Territory’s submission for the State Preparedness Report,
Ability to control the depth level of aggregate (roll-up) reports.
General Changes
Capability for users to restore assessment values from a previously-saved snapshot of the data, including a pre-migration snapshot. NIMSCAST will automatically generate a snapshot before a migration is performed, allowing the account to be restored in the event that a migration is performed in error;
When using “Save and Continue” and “Skip” features on the metrics question input form, NIMSCAST will no longer show questions that do not apply to the account type (to the primary benefit of State Agency and Federal accounts);
Improved handling of update to Tier 1 responses;
NIMSCAST will load the CAP form on first view for metrics not completed and marked non-compliant. Previously, seemingly-complete (but non-compliant) responses needed to be saved before NIMSCAST would display the CAP form, allowing metrics questions to be deemed fully complete.
If a non-compliant response is edited to become a compliant response, the system will automatically mark the CAP as complete and notify the user of the action completed. Users retains the ability to mark the CAP as complete or incomplete based on their discretion; and
Ability for users to “return” to the previous metric after saving it.
FEMA continues to update NIMSCAST based on user feedback.
